Usurping the Throne

Tags: Abusive relationship, domination, F/m, humiliation, monarchy, revenge, shrink

Yekaterina looked in the mirror and took a deep breath, knowing that tonight had to be the night.  She adjusted the powdered wig that covered her long blond hair and ran her hands down her gold dress, smoothing out the wrinkles from sitting upon the throne all day.  Her gray eyes looked from her feet to her head, and she dabbed a bit of powder on her nose to cover a blemish.  If she was going to do this, she needed to look immaculate.

She turned to the left and stood straight, puffing out her chest.  “Empress Yekaterina, sole ruler of the Russian Empire,” she said aloud, trying out how it felt.  The words were like music to her ears, so she bowed and tried again.  “Yekaterina, Empress of all lands from the Baltics to Alaska, Grand Duchess of Muscovy, Kiev, Riga… oh hell, we can never remember all of them in order.  But we don’t have to.”  Thrusting her chin upward, she grabbed the scepter from the dressing table and started the long journey to her bedchambers.

Two guards in long, heavy coats with black Astrakhan hats opened the double doors for her, and she strode between them with nary a nod.  Her heels clicked on the wooden floor, echoing through the long, empty hallway.  Crystal chandeliers hung twenty feet overhead, and portraits of her predecessors going back to Ivan the Great lined the walls with gazes that seemed to follow her.  Their spirits knew there was more at stake than one man’s dignity, and they were watching over her to make sure tonight was a success.

The patriarch would never endorse her methods even if he agreed they were possible.  He would say that sorcery was blasphemous, and that just by considering it she was damning her soul.  What did he know if it, though?  Her husband’s tarnishing of what Russia was and could be, the decline of their international reputation, and wasting precious time and resources in wars that had already been won – that was true blasphemy.  She was stopping one long blasphemous act.

Halfway down the hall she was joined by a large, barrel-chested man doing his best to dress inconspicuously, with a tattered green soldier’s cloak draped over a soiled white shirt.  His thick brown beard covered a mass of scars on his face and neck, and a black eye patch covered an eyeball he had lost years ago.  He did not dare look at Yekaterina in case someone was watching and stared straight ahead.

“Will the Empress be needing my services tonight?” he asked.  Not an unusual question from him, but tonight it was in a different context.  “I have twenty at the ready, and more can be called upon at a moment’s notice.”

“No, Grigoriy, we shall not,” she answered.  “We have the situation quite well in hand.  Simply have some of your men wrap another in a sheet and carry him out in the night.  We will need a more mundane explanation for the Emperor’s disappearance.”  Grigoriy acknowledged her words with a nod and stopped in his tracks while Yekaterina proceeded onward.

When she approached the large, gilded door at the end of the hall, two more guards, these dressed in vibrant blue tailcoats, pulled the doors inward so she could pass.  She paid these no mind either, though she waited just inside for them to shut it after her.  They would not believe it if they saw it, but she wanted no witnesses to the act.

Yekaterina spotted Pyotr on the far side of the room, pacing at the foot of their bed.  He was already in his nightgown and muttering something that she could not hear, though she imagined it was no less inane than the things he said for everyone to hear.  His imperial attire was laid on a chair beside the bed, leaving her with one fewer thing to explain.  The table of toy soldiers was set up for another ridiculous battle he would make her take part in despite her protests, no doubt with frequent reminders that he could have her executed with a word. 

“Finally, our German whore arrives!” he declared upon seeing her.  “We were starting to worry we’d have to fuck one of the court girls tonight.”  Those two sentences burned away any doubts Yekaterina still harbored.  How casually he could say such cruel things astounded her, and they reminded her of every indignity she suffered because of him.  After tonight she would bear it no longer.

Furious, Yekaterina stormed toward him, her hand gripping the scepter so tightly her knuckles turned white.  When she was about twenty feet away from him she raised it, pointing the jewel directly at him.  Pyotr recoiled from her and tried to get the corner of the bed between them.  Though he did not know the true power she wielded with it, even he was smart enough to retreat from an angry person brandishing what amounted to an expensive club.

Yekaterina shouted a word found only in the oldest Chronicles, and Pyotr felt his body seized by a cocoon of force.  She watched gleefully as he dwindled before her eyes while he stared up at her in horror.  Before long he was the size of a mouse, and the magic was still affecting his body.  When it had run its course, he was the size of one of his toy soldiers, though made of flesh and blood rather than pewter.

She strode confidently toward him, her footfalls like cracks of thunder to his diminished ears.  Yekaterina followed him easily: even at his size, his white nightgown was easy to spot against the brown floor panels as he indecisively ran back and forth.  When she was almost standing on top of him, she heard faint squeaks coming from the tiny emperor on the floor.  No doubt he was calling for the guards, but even if they could hear him, they were powerless.  The only people who knew this ancient magic were her and a pair of mystics who lived on the shores of the White Sea.

Yekaterina soon grew tired of watching him scurry about her feet, and she put a stop to it.  “Such a small man to rule such a large empire,” she boomed, and he froze to gawk up at her.  “We think it’s best you leave the great Russian Empire to big people while you retire to rule over people your own size.”  A series of furious squeaks answered her, and Yekaterina knew she had hit a nerve.  The more impotent rage he threw at her, the more satisfied she was with her decision.

Pyotr dashed for the door in a desperate bid to get help, and Yekaterina watched him run to her side.  He was faster than she expected for how puny he was, but there was no way he could outpace her.  In ten seconds he had not moved as far as a single stride would take her, and she decided to end the farce.

Yekaterina stepped forward and set her foot down in Pyotr’s path, making a loud crack when her toes landed on hard wood.  She stifled a laugh while she watched the tiny emperor stumble into her shoe, then waited to see what he did next.  He pushed off the leather wall in front of him and tried to run between her legs, and she could scarcely believe how inept his escape was as she simply picked up her foot to block him again.  Pyotr tried to go around the outside of her shoe, and she merely had to rotate the shoe on its heel to cut him off.

Though watching her husband’s flailing was amusing, Yekaterina needed to wrap this up.  She flicked her foot forward, striking Pyotr with the toe of her shoe so he was sent flying away.  He landed about a foot in front of her and laid on the ground, stunned.  Yekaterina bent forward and reached for him while he futilely tried to scoot away.

Yekaterina set her middle finger down on Pyotr’s chest, holding him in place, then reached over his head with her thumb and index finger.  She pinched the back of his collar and plucked him off the ground, letting him dangle helplessly beneath her hand.  When she stood to her full height, she was holding him around waist level, and appropriately enough like a handkerchief to be disposed of.  While he thrashed in her grip, only succeeding in making himself swing like a pendulum, she started walking toward the table of toy soldiers.

When she reached it, Yekaterina found a spot for the little emperor.  She moved him toward the small open area in the middle of the right side while he uselessly fought against her, then dropped him into the circle cleared of tiny pewter soldiers.  Her fingers released him into the small degree of freedom he would be granted for the rest of his life, then she leaned down to say farewell.

Pyotr was astounded to see Yekaterina’s gigantic face looming over him, and he was cowed into momentary silence.  Her nose alone was taller than him, and a mouth vastly larger than he was acted as a threat on its own.  She stared at him intently with enormous eyes, and he felt paralyzed beneath his gaze.  He was looking at the Empress and sole ruler of the Russian Empire, with grandeur and size to match the office.

“We do apologize that your uniform does not match that of your new soldiers,” Yekaterina boomed, the sheer power of her voice making Pyotr stumble back.  “However, we must make do.  We also hope you understand this means you are deposed, and any action you take against me will be against all of Russia.”  Pyotr gulped and nodded.  Even if he could get down, the path to regaining his throne started with the impossible task of getting back to his original height.  He was much safer here, ruling over his beloved toy soldiers while she handled the country.

Yekaterina gave him a long, harsh look and stood, sure her point had been made.  She banged on the door, and the guards opened it so she could stroll out.  Neither of them questioned her upon her exit.  Not only was she known for keeping odd hours, but the smallest hint of an impertinent question would lead to a reduction in rank at best.

As she walked, Yekaterina was again rejoined by Grigoriy.  “Is it done, my Empress?”

“Yes, it is done,” she answered.  “Pay off the guards, and we will sign whatever expense for any of your men who get implicated in his disappearance.  We want this to be completely bloodless.”

“Understood, my Empress.”  Grigori halted and watched as Yekaterina walked off for one of her late-night strolls in the Winter Palace’s gardens.

Suddenly, Yekaterina spun on her heel to face him.  “And do what you can to encourage those ghastly rumors about us and the horse.  That should dissuade any suspicion about us and a tiny husband.”

Grigoriy balked, but he did not waiver in his duties.  “Yes, my Empress,” he replied, and brought his heels together with a bow.  He disappeared into a dark corridor of the palace while Yekaterina continued on her way, the click of her heels echoing through the cavernous hallway.  She had a coronation to plan now, and she needed to help a grieving nation get over the loss of its Emperor.